Reimagining the Mahabharata: Madhulita Mohapatra's latest dance performance tells Draupadi's story

Draupadi’s Mahabharata … the epic that began with her is our Odissi dance drama presentation that retells the Mahabharata through Draupadi’s eyes. Most of us know the epic through the great war and the heroes, but here, the emotional thread is Draupadi—her birth from fire, her dignity, her love, her silences, her questions, and the way one woman’s fate becomes a turning point in history.

In the performance, viewers can expect a clear, story-led journey—not a lecture, and not a loud spectacle—told through classical Odissi dance vocabulary, abhinaya, group formations, and strong rhythm. We move through the key moments: her swayamvara, forest exile, the crucial turn of events that follows at Kunti’s hut, the game of dice, the court humiliation, and then the battlefield of Kurukshetra—ending with what stays after victory: grief, memory, and questions.

I chose Draupadi because, for me, she holds the Mahabharata together in a deeply human way.

The epic is filled with heroes, warriors, and moral ideals, but Draupadi stands at the centre of its emotional and ethical journey. From her birth out of fire to her presence in the silence after the war, almost every crucial turning point of the Mahabharata touches her life. When we view the epic through her, it moves beyond a story of battles and victories and becomes a reflection on choices, conscience, and their consequences.

What draws me most to Draupadi is her inner conflict. She is neither flawless nor one-dimensional. She loves, questions, resists, endures, and speaks when silence becomes impossible. She faces war outside—in courts and on battlefields—but also a war within herself, where dignity, duty, anger, and restraint are in constant dialogue. That inner struggle feels timeless and relatable.

I did not choose Draupadi to retell the Mahabharata differently, but to approach it with sincerity and respect, and to allow the epic to speak through a voice that dares to question. Through her, the story opens conversations that remain relevant even today—about power and pride, greed and silence, violence and its lasting wounds. Seen through Draupadi, the Mahabharata becomes not just a story of the past, but a mirror to our own times, reminding us of the human cost of injustice and the price of standing by the truth.

To be very honest, the process was not driven by the idea of doing ‘research’ in a formal sense. It grew very naturally from a long personal engagement with the Mahabharata. Over the years, whenever I read, listened to, or reflected on the epic, it was Draupadi’s presence that stayed with me the most. So the starting point of this work was more about listening inwardly—asking what moved me deeply, what disturbed me, and what continued to linger.

Of course, I kept returning to the Mahabharata itself—its key moments, its pauses, and its turning points—but always with one simple question in mind: how does Draupadi live through this moment? I was not trying to examine every character or retell the entire epic, but to stay with the emotional truth of her journey—her birth with a purpose, her brief exercise of choice at the swayamvara, the times her life is decided without her will, when she is divided among five husbands and later staked in the game of dice, the court humiliation that marks the moral breaking point, and finally the heavy silence and loss that remain after the war.

As the narrative took shape, the script, music, and movement evolved together. The Sanskrit and Odia verses were shaped with poetic inputs by Ashtavadhani Shri Balachandra Bhat and Shri Kedar Mishra, which gave depth, dignity, and a quiet authority to Draupadi’s voice. The music by Shri Rupak Kumar Parida and the rhythm by Guru Dhaneswar Swain were developed in close conversation with the choreography—helping each scene find its emotional tone, whether tenderness, shock, rage, stillness, the intensity of war, or the silence that follows.

From there, the work grew slowly through the body and through rehearsal. Scenes were shaped and reshaped in the studio—through abhinaya, rhythm, group formations, and stillness—until they felt honest and restrained. Working closely with the dancers helped bring clarity to the storytelling, allowing the emotions to speak with honesty and sincerity.

Yes, there were challenges—mainly because the Mahabharata is so vast, and Draupadi’s journey is so intense. The first challenge was what to leave out. We were very clear that we are not presenting the whole epic, so we had to choose only those moments that carry her inner journey—her brief moments of choice, the moments when her autonomy is taken away, the court episode, and then the silence after the war.

The second challenge was tone and balance. Some scenes are filled with beauty and tenderness, like the swayamvara and the romantic interlude, and then the narrative moves into moments that are painful, heartbreaking, and deeply unsettling. As a choreographer, it was important for me that these transitions feel seamless and the audience is emotionally guided from one lived experience to another.

Another challenge was portraying painful moments with dignity—allowing them to be deeply felt without slipping into sensationalism. Odissi, with its rich classicism and refined aesthetics, makes this possible; through abhinaya, the form allows us to communicate profound emotion with grace, restraint, and quiet strength.

There were also practical challenges—because it is a strong ensemble narrative. Group formations, timing, and clarity become very important when you are telling a story through many bodies on stage, like in war sequences. Small changes in rhythm, spacing, or tempo can completely change the impact.

And finally, the most meaningful part—was to keep Draupadi human. She is often seen only as a symbol of vengeance or as a trigger for the war. For me, she is a woman who has loved, questioned, endured, and carried loss. Holding on to that emotional truth throughout the production simply required all of us to stay sincere in our approach.

I feel grateful that I could shape this work with such dedicated collaborators—our poets, our music and rhythm composers, and my dancers—because that shared commitment is what helped the performance find its clarity and purpose.

I want to create choreographic works that explore inner questions rather than fixed answers—about the self, awareness, conscience, and our place within a larger shared existence—and that speak gently and honestly to the times we live in, acknowledging our diversity, our fractures, and our shared longing for harmony. I have also begun an artistic collaboration that brings together Western opera and Odissi, which I hope to return to with care—listening, learning, and shaping it slowly—so that both traditions are respected as part of a meaningful cultural exchange and allowed to meet organically, opening a space where art can connect, heal, and remind us of our shared humanity.